stupid shit people in record stores say

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  • tuneuptuneup 586 Posts
    "oh I have records. but I would Neeeeeeeever Sell them"

    usually recited by a 40 something mother of 2 with beat Simon & Garfunkle Lp's.....

  • SwayzeSwayze 14,705 Posts
    "can i get into the back? i know all the good stuff's in the back.."

    yes, we make a point of hiding all our good records from our customers. just waiting for ballers like you to come in, to dig through every record in the back, bust my balls about their condition and walk away with a ten dollar purchase.

  • I found this for $1.


    b/w


    I got this on ebay for $7

    One of my homies always does this to me. In a really loud voice "Damn, Phil, 7 bucks, I got that for a dollar!" He also pulls out a common record, "Hey, Philthis is the one that Primo/Pete Rock/Just Blaze/Kanye used on that track!" really loud so that everyone hears him. I always cringe and feel a little embarressed.

  • Big_ChanBig_Chan 5,088 Posts
    I found this for $1.


    b/w


    I got this on ebay for $7

    One of my homies always does this to me. In a really loud voice "Damn, Phil, 7 bucks, I got that for a dollar!" He also pulls out a common record, "Hey, Philthis is the one that Primo/Pete Rock/Just Blaze/Kanye used on that track!" really loud so that everyone hears him. I always cringe and feel a little embarressed.

    Word. I hate when Mangoman does that when we're at record stores in Mexico!

  • MangomanMangoman 549 Posts
    I found this for $1.


    b/w


    I got this on ebay for $7

    One of my homies always does this to me. In a really loud voice "Damn, Phil, 7 bucks, I got that for a dollar!" He also pulls out a common record, "Hey, Philthis is the one that Primo/Pete Rock/Just Blaze/Kanye used on that track!" really loud so that everyone hears him. I always cringe and feel a little embarressed.

    Word. I hate when Mangoman does that when we're at record stores in Mexico!

    LOL ahahah! Nah Never that I like to keep my mouth shut, I like to keep the records I pick up on the DL.... Plus I can never remember who sampled what anymore.... As long as it has open Banjo Breaks or 137BPM it's GOOD! I like that ish FAST!!!!

  • ZachDZachD 318 Posts
    Yesterday dude in his 20s comes in, looks at LPs for about a half hour...meandering between rcok and jazz racks. Comes up to me and asks if we "had any shellac".

    Weirdos.


    Younger dude maybe 25 who has come in several times and asks if I ordered any Trance records yet which I always say we're trying to (or maybe not !

    He says "that's cool, well I'm going to go listen to these that I brought in". Dude procedes to go to a listening station and listen to his own records like a true


    Until he comes back a minute later and he asks if there is something wrong with the pitch control on our table.

    I say "Maybe try it on 45".


    He tries and now he's like


    After about 30 mins I forget about him until I hear him making trance record noises with his mouth

    Eventually after what might have been 2 hours of listening to hip-hop, dance, and his own trance records, he finally comes away with 1 record - "The Police - Every Breath you Take, the Singles" for $5 (on his credit card) which leaves me puzzled but also releaved.

  • DjArcadianDjArcadian 3,630 Posts
    Yesterday dude in his 20s comes in, looks at LPs for about a half hour...meandering between rcok and jazz racks. Comes up to me and asks if we "had any shellac".

    Weirdos.


    Younger dude maybe 25 who has come in several times and asks if I ordered any Trance records yet which I always say we're trying to (or maybe not !

    He says "that's cool, well I'm going to go listen to these that I brought in". Dude procedes to go to a listening station and listen to his own records like a true


    Until he comes back a minute later and he asks if there is something wrong with the pitch control on our table.

    I say "Maybe try it on 45".


    He tries and now he's like


    After about 30 mins I forget about him until I hear him making trance record noises with his mouth

    Eventually after what might have been 2 hours of listening to hip-hop, dance, and his own trance records, he finally comes away with 1 record - "The Police - Every Breath you Take, the Singles" for $5 (on his credit card) which leaves me puzzled but also releaved.



    Dude was at a listening station at Amoeba's in SF. He's spinning around, dancing to the music and yelling out (as loud as possible) "WOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!" "WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!" a la Bub Rub.

  • PrimeCutsLtdPrimeCutsLtd jersey fresh 2,632 Posts
    I'm can't believe the amount of bad music being played in record stores. I guess you get bored with good music after awhile.

  • MikeZeroMikeZero 215 Posts
    Last week a man came in with his teenage daughter and a stack of 120 classic rock albums. Everytime I would pull something from the pile, the daugter would whisper something into her dad's ear. Pst...pst...pst... After checking the conditions of the vinyl, I only came up with four albums which I offered them $8 for. The girl exclaimes, "That's it?!?!?"...and the dad says "No, they're worth more than that". I told them fair enough and offered to help carry them back to the car. Then the dad says, "I don't know how long you've been doing this, but I'll let you know that I was testing you. This record is worth $200." The record..JESUS CHRIST SUPERSTAR. I smiled and said, "Good luck with that...try Ebay". I should have pointed them to the dollar bin where I must have $1200 worth of Superstar...

  • troublemantroubleman 1,928 Posts
    I'm can't believe the amount of bad music being played in record stores. I guess you get bored with good music after awhile.

    uhhh, co-sign. Last time I went out to a record store, they played the entire "Guilty" album by Barbara Striesand and Barry Gibb. I thought it was because it was closing time and by playing something so terrible, everyone would want out, but the employees were sitting there eye's shut, nodding their heads!!@@! I hope to god I never hear that album again in it's entirety.

  • RockadelicRockadelic Out Digging 13,993 Posts
    Last week a man came in with his teenage daughter and a stack of 120 classic rock albums. Everytime I would pull something from the pile, the daugter would whisper something into her dad's ear. Pst...pst...pst... After checking the conditions of the vinyl, I only came up with four albums which I offered them $8 for. The girl exclaimes, "That's it?!?!?"...and the dad says "No, they're worth more than that". I told them fair enough and offered to help carry them back to the car. Then the dad says, "I don't know how long you've been doing this, but I'll let you know that I was testing you. This record is worth $200." The record..JESUS CHRIST SUPERSTAR. I smiled and said, "Good luck with that...try Ebay". I should have pointed them to the dollar bin where I must have $1200 worth of Superstar...

    Great story.

    There's also an entire army of "My Enrico Caruso record is worth $100K" guys out there too.

  • deejdeej 5,125 Posts
    This thread started out rocky but I'm enjoying the anecdotes now.
    My experiences shopping at gramaphone have been pretty good for interesting convos. I'm sure there have been some funny-ass ones, but I've overheard/participated in some pretty interesting shit-shooting with dudes there. Everyone is super-friendly and one dude went on for like 40 mins about his experience working at a crazy west side hospital, and about how one woman stabbed her husband after he cheated and all this other shit. (Sorry I don't have more detail, that one was like 2 yrs ago.)

  • I'm can't believe the amount of bad music being played in record stores. I guess you get bored with good music after awhile.

    uhhh, co-sign. Last time I went out to a record store, they played the entire "Guilty" album by Barbara Striesand and Barry Gibb. I thought it was because it was closing time and by playing something so terrible, everyone would want out, but the employees were sitting there eye's shut, nodding their heads!!@@! I hope to god I never hear that album again in it's entirety.

    at the local spot, theres 3 people working there. the two owners (older dudes), and a younger dude who's in some death metal group. sometimes i'll be in there and the two owners are not in. death metal dude has his bands cd playing SUPER loud on the store system. i can't tell you how much this annoys me. usually i just end up leaving because i cant take that shit. i seriously just want to tell the dude this is the worst music ive ever heard in my life but i never do because i think he might take it as some form of compliment.

  • MikeZeroMikeZero 215 Posts
    I'm can't believe the amount of bad music being played in record stores. I guess you get bored with good music after awhile.

    uhhh, co-sign. Last time I went out to a record store, they played the entire "Guilty" album by Barbara Striesand and Barry Gibb. I thought it was because it was closing time and by playing something so terrible, everyone would want out, but the employees were sitting there eye's shut, nodding their heads!!@@! I hope to god I never hear that album again in it's entirety.

    at the local spot, theres 3 people working there. the two owners (older dudes), and a younger dude who's in some death metal group. sometimes i'll be in there and the two owners are not in. death metal dude has his bands cd playing SUPER loud on the store system. i can't tell you how much this annoys me. usually i just end up leaving because i cant take that shit. i seriously just want to tell the dude this is the worst music ive ever heard in my life but i never do because i think he might take it as some form of compliment.


    I'd just tell the guy that the music is not vibing with your record buying experience. I'm always willing to change the music if someone asks nicely. And yes, people have asked...almost always rap but once a guy took offense to a Phil Ochs record I was playing because he didn't like the anti war lyrics.

  • SoulOnIceSoulOnIce 13,027 Posts
    once a guy took offense to a Phil Ochs record I was playing because he didn't like the anti war lyrics.


    LOL! Yeah, that whole "anti-war" thing can get pretty offensive.
    I mean, what kind of an asshole is against something as beautiful
    and natural as a little old WAR?

  • ladydayladyday 623 Posts
    In the vinyl-only shop near me that caters to djs and clearly advertises the fact that they carry only vinyl: "Don't you have any CDs?"

    My hommie also told me about someone passing out at listening station and cracking his head on a bin and then complaining he was going to sue for "putting the bins too close".

  • pickwick33pickwick33 8,946 Posts
    I'm can't believe the amount of bad music being played in record stores. I guess you get bored with good music after awhile.

    uhhh, co-sign. Last time I went out to a record store, they played the entire "Guilty" album by Barbara Striesand and Barry Gibb. I thought it was because it was closing time and by playing something so terrible, everyone would want out, but the employees were sitting there eye's shut, nodding their heads!!@@! I hope to god I never hear that album again in it's entirety.

    Everything sounds bad to somebody sometime, so I can't get too worked up over somebody else's fucked-up musical tastes.

    once a guy took offense to a Phil Ochs record I was playing because he didn't like the anti war lyrics.

    I can go you one better...during my long lost record store days, somebody was playing a college radio station in the store....the DJ was playing some Phil Ochs record where he was assuming the character of some bigot who didn't want to deal with all the "niggers"...right about that time a group of five black teens from the nearby high school walked in, and they were like "WTF?"...one of my coworkers explained the situation, that it was some 1960's folksinger PROTESTING racism...they accepted the excuse and went on about their record-buying business.

  • pickwick33pickwick33 8,946 Posts
    none of this stuff really bothers me, except for the the know-it-all who will talk at you, instead of talk to you, about records. please, get your OCD under control.

    never talk records with a guy that can quote prices but doesnt quote the music

  • pickwick33pickwick33 8,946 Posts
    Sometimes customers think Clerks are the Steven Hawking's of their field...


    Back in college I worked at the NYC Port Authority "Bus Terminal Book Barn" store that sold mostly paperbacks to commuters.

    Not a day went by when a customer didn't come up to me with a book and ask me if it was good, as if I had read every book in the store.

    the only time this bothered me, working in a record store, was if somebody asked me about something that wasn't my kind of music...i could never get over that. even now, the only time i ever ask somebody in a store about a record is when i knew their tastes went that way. we dont all listen to the same music, so wouldnt that make sense? i never lied about it; if it wasnt my schtick, i just pointed at somebody who knew more about it.

    probably the weirdest example was when mary j. blige's first album came out and some lady kept asking me over and over: "...but what is the CUT?" (i.e., which song is the big hit that they play on the radio) i politely told her that mary j.'s kind of music wasnt my shot and that she should ask somebody else...but in my mind im going "lady, if you need the radio to make up your mind for you, youre in baaaaad shape"


  • ive gotta say i kinda hate it when people reach over and slam the shit out of my fader (this is the store's house set up) with some faux ass crab skratching motions.
    ...ive let people session and skratch before... but fuck a person can ask first.

    then there are the people who call four or five times a week to see if we have any new bay records in despite me saying that i dont anticipate any coming in soon.

    sometimes people will come in looking for a record, and if we say we dont have it they get all sourfaced like i was supposed to know he wanted one and i should have held it for him.... serisouly some people act downright bitchy and complain about us being out of something.

    serato. some people act like serato is the end all to their record buying... if it is, fine. but dont mention it to me... dont say "WELL AFTER I GET SERATO IM JUST GONNA BUY RICK LEE'S CD COLLECTION FOR LIKE A COUPLE BILLS AND RIP IT"



    this guy calls me up asking if we had such and such bay area compilation. so i walk over and look to see if we have it. turns out we do and then dude proceeds to ask me the bpm of 18 dummy. i already knew it was in the 110 range so i said "oh some where around 110" and he asks me to look at the lable to find out exactly... then he asks me to read off the bpms for all the other songs on there and im like "if you know the songs that are on here and that the label has the bpms...but you are asking for the bpms... you must not physically have this record..."
    there was some silence and it turns out he ripped his friends copy (he uses cdjs) but didnt write down the bpms. so he was calling me for the bpms.
    i wanted to rip on this guy so hard for that. i mean seriously HOW FUCKING LAME ARE YOU THAT YOU CANT FIGURE OUT SOME BPMS. plus he didnt even pay for the record and he wants to waste my time looking some shit up for someone who doesnt and will never shop here? i had to ever so slightly give him a hard time... but i gave him the fucking bpms and that was that.

  • pickwick33pickwick33 8,946 Posts
    Yesterday dude in his 20s comes in, looks at LPs for about a half hour...meandering between rcok and jazz racks. Comes up to me and asks if we "had any shellac". I said maybe, it would be in the alternative/indie section under "S". He says "ok" and goes over there. While he is looking I remember we bought some Shellac 7"s off a dude last week and they hadnt been put out yet, so I go find them, price them and go up to him and say "here these just came in" and hand them to him. He looks at them for a good 20 seconds or so and says "no man, I dont think you understand me, I mean really old records"

    Wouldnt he have known I didnt understand his question when I sent him to the "S" bin?

    I just pointed him to the 78s.

    Weirdos.

    sorta like the guy that came in the store i used to work at, asking for a dave brubeck album. only he didnt ask for the album, he referred to it by its label and catalog number (?!?). "Do you have Columbia CL 727" or some such foolishness.

  • Mike_BellMike_Bell 5,736 Posts
    After reading all of these posts, I have come to the conclusion that if I had ever worked in a record store, I would shoot myself in the face (one month into the job).

  • leolyxxxleolyxxx 446 Posts
    The store i used to work in was right in the touristy part of Stockholm and some of the tourists are always acting crazy.. this one finnish guy who must had come straight off the boat asked for "a beer and a hot dog" and when i replied that we didn't seel alcohol he "wanted just the hotdog" , man what a moron..

    We also had a finnish raver type guy with orange pants falling asleep/passing out in front of the techno section with a dragonfly cd in his hand, one of the funniset things i've seen, he had sunglasses on inside and looked like he'd been partying for 2 years straight hahaha..

    /L

  • crossingscrossings 946 Posts
    you shoulda given him:





    and



  • leolyxxxleolyxxx 446 Posts
    you shoulda given him:





    and



    hahahahaha good point!

    Also one thing i hated in the store is when moms and other non-record related persons comes up and just comes in and even without even try to look around says "i can't find anyhting here, give me this and that record" , always stressed and always a little bit angry.. they might figure out the mind boggling alphabetical order if they just took a breath and didn't try so hard to be "that sassy perfect career mom" you read so much about

    /L

  • hammertimehammertime 2,389 Posts


    probably the weirdest example was when mary j. blige's first album came out and some lady kept asking me over and over: "...but what is the CUT?" (i.e., which song is the big hit that they play on the radio) i politely told her that mary j.'s kind of music wasnt my shot and that she should ask somebody else...but in my mind im going "lady, if you need the radio to make up your mind for you, youre in baaaaad shape"



    orrrr maybe she heard the song on the radio and liked it but didn't know what it was called?



    Anyway I don't mind crappy MOR music in record stores, it's a lot better than the avant-garde/noise/drone shit they seem to play in every store up here. A record of someone repeatedly stepping on a creaky wooden board may work in some situations, but a record store is not one of them!

  • dmacdmac 472 Posts

    there was some silence and it turns out he ripped his friends copy (he uses cdjs) but didnt write down the bpms. so he was calling me for the bpms.
    i wanted to rip on this guy so hard for that. i mean seriously HOW FUCKING LAME ARE YOU THAT YOU CANT FIGURE OUT SOME BPMS. plus he didnt even pay for the record and he wants to waste my time looking some shit up for someone who doesnt and will never shop here? i had to ever so slightly give him a hard time... but i gave him the fucking bpms and that was that.

    That's fucked. He's either lazy, cheap, or stupid. Or maybe all three.
    Most quality CDJs give you the BPMs automatically. Was this kid using a couple of Sony Discmans in his DJ gear?


  • bassiebassie 11,710 Posts
    After reading all of these posts, I have come to the conclusion that if I had ever worked in a record store, I would shoot myself in the face (one month into the job).

    depends on the store.

    it's more fun to talk about the annoying shit i guess, but i loved working at record stores. i didn't work anywhere too big or strict, so we never had to listen to anything shitty and for every person who was totally aggravating, there were two more who loved music, were totally open to suggestions and taught me something new. i especially liked the folks who would come in with their kids who were obviously used to waiting around on their parent(s) looking through music and would nod/dance while they walked around or sat around in the stroller.

  • The_Hook_UpThe_Hook_Up 8,182 Posts
    After reading all of these posts, I have come to the conclusion that if I had ever worked in a record store, I would shoot myself in the face (one month into the job).

    depends on the store.

    it's more fun to talk about the annoying shit i guess, but i loved working at record stores. i didn't work anywhere too big or strict, so we never had to listen to anything shitty and for every person who was totally aggravating, there were two more who loved music, were totally open to suggestions and taught me something new. i especially liked the folks who would come in with their kids who were obviously used to waiting around on their parent(s) looking through music and would nod/dance while they walked around or sat around in the stroller.

    word. Although I am used to making a HELLUVA lot more money at my old Sports Medicine gig, working at the record shop is the best job I have ever had. There isnt a day I wake up that I dont want to come into work. I get to spend all day with records... researching them, selling them, buying them, listening to them...meeting music legends, meeting crazy as shit people that make you laugh, etc. I have chosen to live on less money just so I can have a job that I really love.

  • Jonny_PaycheckJonny_Paycheck 17,825 Posts
    After reading all of these posts, I have come to the conclusion that if I had ever worked in a record store, I would shoot myself in the face (one month into the job).

    depends on the store.

    it's more fun to talk about the annoying shit i guess, but i loved working at record stores. i didn't work anywhere too big or strict, so we never had to listen to anything shitty and for every person who was totally aggravating, there were two more who loved music, were totally open to suggestions and taught me something new. i especially liked the folks who would come in with their kids who were obviously used to waiting around on their parent(s) looking through music and would nod/dance while they walked around or sat around in the stroller.

    word. Although I am used to making a HELLUVA lot more money at my old Sports Medicine gig, working at the record shop is the best job I have ever had. There isnt a day I wake up that I dont want to come into work. I get to spend all day with records... researching them, selling them, buying them, listening to them...meeting music legends, meeting crazy as shit people that make you laugh, etc. I have chosen to live on less money just so I can have a job that I really love.

    Word to that.
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